The Kiss (4 page)

‘Cormac, I was talking to you.’ Rachel’s voice had softened. ‘Don’t think you heard me though, did you?’

He blinked. His wife was regarding him quizzically. She had taken off her coat and was sitting at the kitchen table. She looked tired. She’d probably had a hard day at work and the last thing she needed was trouble at home.

‘What did you say the girl’s name was?’

He did not recall saying. ‘Clarinda Bain,’ he said now with some difficulty.

‘What age is she exactly?’

‘Sixteen.’

‘Thank goodness for that! At least she’s past the age of consent.’

‘She was only fifteen when we were in Paris.’
‘Oh
no
!’

‘She had her sixteenth birthday the day after we came back.’

‘That won’t be taken into account.’

‘When I am called to account? Rachel, I want you to know that I did not attempt to seduce her.’

‘It’s terrible that you should be suspended on her say-so.’

‘It’s the rules.’

‘Oh, I know Archie wouldn’t have done it if he could have avoided it. But what evidence do the Bains have?’

‘None, except Clarinda’s word. But that is enough. A word from her. And one from her mother.’ He groaned at the thought of her mother. She would not be a reluctant witness in the box, she’d let her imagination take wing and soar into orbit.

‘What are we to tell Sophie? Fourteen is a such a difficult age, especially for coping with something like this. At least Davy’s too young for it to impinge on him.’

‘What will other people think?’ said Cormac, his voice edged with sarcasm which Rachel did not appear to be registering. ‘No smoke, you know.’

‘It’s not going to be very amusing, certainly.’

‘No, not exactly a laugh a minute. I’ll be tarnished.’ He wondered if he should scrub his hands until they were pink and raw and clean. Clean hands, clean heart.
His heart didn’t feel clean; it felt murderous. Towards Archie Gibson, which was not rational, and Clarinda Bain, which was.

‘Clarinda Bain,’ said Rachel. ‘Wasn’t she the pretty fair-haired girl who played Ophelia in the school play last year? Good actress.’

‘Yes, she should do well in the witness box.’
Witness box?
Was all of this real? He still had the feeling of being caught up in a nightmare that must surely end with the coming of daylight. But no matter which way he turned he could see no light.

‘She looked very mature for her age.’

‘They all do these days.’ He patted his pocket then remembered that he had given up smoking a couple of years ago. Sophie’s nagging had made him give up as much as anything else. She had threatened to leave home for a cleaner environment if he did not.

‘I suppose,’ said Rachel, then stopped.

‘Suppose what?’

‘Well, you didn’t …? No, I’m sure you wouldn’t.’

‘Oh good, I’m glad you have faith in me.’

‘She couldn’t have, well, misread the signals?’

‘What bloody signals? I don’t give out
signals
, dammit, I’m not a transmitter, I
talk
to my pupils, I try to educate them. That’s my job.
Was
my job.’

‘All right, no need to go on! It’s just, knowing you—’

‘Do you?’

‘For God’s sake, Cormac, let me finish!’

‘So what do you wish to say about knowing me?’

‘It’s just that you might have put your arm round her in a fatherly sort of way and she might have misinterpreted that. You are a very tactile person, aren’t you?’

‘I can’t help being tactile. It’s the way I am. You like me touching you, don’t you?’

‘I’m your wife, Cormac. But she—’

‘We are strictly forbidden to lay a finger on our pupils. Sometimes you forget and you put a hand on their shoulders. You might even brush against them, inadvertently. Don’t you ever touch your patients?’

‘Of course I do, when I examine them. It’s part of my job, and that is understood.’

‘But don’t you ever want to lay a hand on them in a purely reassuring way? Don’t you ever want to say to them, “It’s going to be all right?”’

‘Sometimes I might but I’m conscious that there’s a thin dividing line between what is admissible and what is not. I’m very careful, always.’

‘I’m sure you are. Bloody careful! You’d never act without thinking, would you?’

‘I have to be careful. I’d be struck off if I weren’t. But don’t take it out on me, please, Cormac! It’s not my fault.’

There it was: the first crack in their marriage. Not true, of course: with temperaments as diverse as theirs there had inevitably been small cracks and fissures over the years, but they had mostly healed or been plastered over so that the ruptures did not show, except in times of stress.

Rachel yawned suddenly, allowing a wave of tiredness to sweep over her. She stood up. They looked at each other, then he opened his arms to her and she moved into them, letting her head fall against his shoulder. He rested his face in her hair. ‘It’s going to be all right,’ he wanted to tell her, but the words would not come.

On leaving Clarinda’s tea shop Cormac unlocks his bicycle and cycles back across Princes Street, stopping off to buy two litres of milk which he stows in his wicker basket. The rest of his shopping he did the night before. He finds it a boon that one can shop at all hours of the day and night.

He opens up his shop.
Cormac’s Carry-Outs.
Come and get them freshly cut! When he started he put leaflets through the letter boxes of various companies in the area. This is his little empire. Here, he can do whatever he wishes. He has freedom of choice. He can make tuna sandwiches with raspberries, smoked mackerel with cream cheese, pork with anchovy, should it take his fancy, which it doesn’t particularly. He doesn’t have to
be answerable to anyone but his customers. And if they don’t like what he has on offer they can go elsewhere. The sandwich business is booming. They have grown up around the city like mushrooms.
Quick Bites. Better Bites. Food for Thought.
And so on, and on. Sometimes there’s just the owner’s name. Quite a few of the names are Irish, Cormac has noted, and is not sure what to make of that. That the Irish are good at making sandwiches or that they’re more often desperate and on their uppers? His mother would go mad if she saw his name emblazoned above a shop selling sandwiches.

So now, instead of nurturing young minds, putting ideas into their heads that won’t lead to secure jobs in the Scottish Office or Scottish Widows, he is feeding the bellies of the citizens of Edinburgh, the bank and insurance clerks, the legal secretaries, the lawyers, the hairdressers and psychotherapists, the slaters and steeple jacks, the road diggers, the traffic wardens, the policemen who pull up in their squad cars on the double yellow line, the occasional housewife who wants to eat someone else’s sandwiches for a change. He gets all kinds. It takes all kinds to put enough money through the till, to fill his belly and that of his son. He is not prepared to be subsidised by his wife. Or ex-wife, as she really is, even though they are not divorced. She offered, but he refused.

He goes through to the kitchen at the back and lays bacon in neat rashers under the grill. BLT is always popular, as is tuna mayonnaise and coronation chicken, though he does do a few more esoteric mixtures using avocados and Chinese gooseberries. He takes the ingredients for today’s fillings out of the fridge, which is everything in the fridge. When Rachel finishes work he will borrow the car and go to Cash and Carry and stock up again.

Selina, his help, arrives. She is a former student, one that did listen to his talk. She is a painter and likes to paint predominantly in oil on large canvases. None of her friends can afford them. She comes in stripping herself of various garments to reveal her usual black garb of black leggings and black T-shirt. She has rings in her ears and rings in her nose and perhaps in other places, too, for all Cormac knows. He is glad that, so far, Sophie has shown no sign of getting pierced. One of her friends got her tongue done and it went septic; he thinks, hopes, that may have put Sophie off.

They set to work and by eleven o’clock have laid out on the shelves their offerings of bread sandwiches, on brown, white and rye, and various shapes, sizes and types of rolls, all tidily wrapped in cling film. Cormac takes satisfaction in the presentation of his sandwiches; he wants each one to look perfectly cut, yes, sculpted.
When he sets them out he likes to be able to think, I cannot improve on this, they are everything anyone could wish. When he used to complete a piece of sculpture he would think, it lacks an element, it needs something more, it is not as perfect as I would have wished, as I anticipated, as it was as a concept in my head. ‘So, you see,’ he says to Selina, ‘there is great aesthetic satisfaction to be derived from working in a sandwich bar. And much less trauma than trying to produce a work of art.’

‘You could talk your way round anything, Cormac,’ says Selina. ‘You remind me of my mother’s Uncle Gerry. He was Irish too.’

They stand behind the counter with their handiwork on show, awaiting customers. They begin to trickle in, without fail, which is another aspect that Cormac appreciates. There is no suspense, no waiting to see if anyone will come, as he has had to do in the past when he had a show. And even then, half of those who did come would turn their backs on the exhibits – his creations – and chat to other inveterate exhibitiongoers whilst downing as much free wine as they could lay hands on. Those who come into his shop come for one purpose only: to purchase sandwiches. The main flood comes normally between twelve and one-thirty, then it dwindles to a dribble again.

At half past two, Gentleman Jock pays them his daily visit in his long tattered overcoat with the newspaper stuffed down the front. He pushes an old bicycle with flat tyres and broken spokes; from its twisted handlebars hang an assortment of old carrier bags. He is one of the old homeless, not the new, who are to be seen dotted at regular intervals along Princes Street with their dogs and pieces of cardboard saying
HOMELESS AND HUNGRY
. Jock has been on the road for more years than he can remember, though once he worked in a hotel, had a good job, accommodation provided, was working up to be head porter, and then he had a nervous breakdown, and that had more or less been that.

‘What do you fancy today then, Jock?’ asks Cormac. ‘Cheese and pickle? Smoked chicken and salad?’

Jock fancies anything as long as it is edible. He waits on the pavement while Cormac goes to fetch the food. He would never make a move to come inside or expect to be asked. He understands. Nevertheless, Cormac feels badly that he never does ask him to come through to the back kitchen and warm himself. Who does he think he is? Lord Muck doling out hand-outs and feeling pleased with himself? But take care not to pollute my cosy little world! Do not step over the mark. Bloody hypocrisy. ‘But he stinks,’ says Selina. ‘The
place would smell like a doss house afterwards. You’d lose customers. You might have to close. You’d be out of work. And so would I.’ In spite of having listened to him during her formative years she is sensible, sharp and streetwise. He makes a mental note to bring in a pair of thick hiking socks for the old fella.

At three, Cormac has to go, to leave Selina to do the final clearing up. He jumps back on his bike and heads for the school playground where he joins the gaggle of mothers and grandmothers and the occasional father and grandfather clustered round the gate.

The phone is ringing as they come in. Davy drops his bags and goes ahead to answer it.

‘Oh, hi, Grandma!’ he says. ‘We were at the Cash and Carry. You know, where you get cheap stuff. For Dad’s sandwiches. He thought he’d best get it today even though he doesn’t open on Saturdays, so he’ll be all set for Monday.’

Cormac can imagine his mother’s reaction at the other end of the line. ‘
Sandwiches
, Davy? What sandwiches?’

‘For his sandwich bar. He makes all kinds. I like BLT the best.’

‘Better give me the phone.’ Cormac holds out his hand.

‘You’re working in a
sandwich
bar,’ says his mother, her incredulity travelling across the Irish sea. What an amazing thing science is, Cormac reflects, and what a damned nuisance it can be too. Oh for the days when letters went to and fro bobbing about on the waves taking days, weeks, to reach their targets. Or perhaps, if one was lucky, going soggy on the sea crossing, and sinking without trace.

‘I’m not working in one, Ma. It’s mine. I’m the proprietor.’

‘What
is
a sandwich bar?’ she demands to know. Of course she is out of touch with modern life. How could she not be sitting there in her terraced house, leaving it only to venture to the corner shop and the church? Sandwich bars don’t touch her life, God may be praised for that.

‘A place that sells sandwiches,’ he explains patiently. ‘It’s got nothing to do with a pub. I only sell orange and apple juice in cartons and Coca-Cola, Seven-Up and Irn-Bru in tins.’

‘You’re running one of these things? When I think—’

‘I know, I know!’ He can follow her thoughts. She will be relishing the memory of every sacrifice, every cream bun passed over, every holiday not taken, so that he could get a good education. And then he went to Art College! He might have been better leaving school at
sixteen and learning a trade. He could have had his own plumbing business by now and be driving a BMW. But he is being too cynical. She’s a decent woman, after all. And it’s indecent of him to be lampooning her, even in his head. She’s got courage and nerve and holds steady to her beliefs, qualities not to be dismissed. And she brought him up, fed him and cared for him. He sighs and says he’s sorry.

‘But why aren’t you at the school?’ When he went into teaching, giving way, on marriage, to realism, she thought he had come to his senses. ‘You never got the sack, did you?’

He is only half listening. He has been thinking about Rachel on their wedding day, her dark head sleek under a white veil – both mothers had been so happy that it had been a proper church wedding with all the trimmings, even though the bride was five months pregnant – and how she looked up at him with her calm grey eyes and agreed to take him on for better or worse. He thought then that there was no way this bond between them could ever be rent asunder.

‘
Did
you get the sack, Cormac?’

‘No, Ma, nothing like that. I just decided to leave.’

‘To
leave
! Don’t you realise how lucky you were to be having such a good job? And to exchange it for a
sandwich bar
!’

‘I always liked cooking,’ he says defensively. ‘It’s creative.’ And easier than sculpture, he adds, and more lucrative, but too quietly for her to hear.

‘Making sandwiches is not what I’d call cooking!’

He remembers hers as white-breaded, triangular, daintily cut, and crustless, with thin fillings of fish paste, egg and cress, ham, and something called sandwich spread which was a kind of salad cream with bits in it. The sandwiches rested on snowy white doilies and were served up when the priest or her sisters came to call. Cormac tells her that sandwiches are a different affair entirely these days; they’re hearty, offered up on long slices of baguette or in thick Italian rolls, and bursting with filling. He rattles off a list of fillings, hoping to stun her into silence, or perhaps even impress her. Tuna mayonnaise, coronation chicken, brie and lettuce, smoked salmon and cream cheese, Stilton and celery, ham and pineapple, turkey and avocado, BLT—At that she stops him in his tracks, demanding to know what BLT means.

‘Bacon, lettuce and tomato. Very popular. Mine is an upmarket sandwich bar, Ma. No greasy fried egg rolls for my customers.’

‘Who buys these sandwiches of yours?’

‘The hungry. Working men and women.’

‘Why don’t they bring their sandwiches with them
from home? It doesn’t take a minute to spread a piece of bread and put a filling in. Any fool could do that. They must have money to burn. Or else they’re too lazy, more like.’

‘Convenience food, Ma. It’s a new age.’

She sighs. ‘It’s time I was away.’ Her voice goes down like a gas flame dwindling to a peep.

‘Come on now, Ma, there’s plenty life in you yet.’

Silence. He thinks he can hear the waves sloshing.

‘Are you all right, Ma?’ He rattles the receiver rest.

‘How can I be all right?’ It is barely a whisper.

‘Will Aunt Lily be coming over to see you?’

‘Lily has her own life to lead. She has her own friends.’

‘Well, listen, just you hang in there and I …’ This is a repeat message. ‘Ma, are you listening? Are you?’

The next day being Saturday, it is his turn to have Sophie, and for Davy to go to his mother. The boy goes eagerly, getting up at the first call, dressing swiftly and packing his overnight bag without being chivvied. Cormac tries not to feel depressed. Sophie, by contrast, when she arrives, shows no sign of eagerness. She can’t stop yawning and when he asks her what she would like to do she lifts one shoulder in a shrug. To make anything of the day they need an uplift and so he decides
to take her out for lunch to a small French bistro in the old town, even though he can’t really afford it. That’s you all over, Cormac, his mother would say. Oh shut up, Ma, he says silently, can’t you let me get me on with my own life!

They walk up to Princes Street, cutting across the stream of Saturday shoppers that eddies and flows along it carrying multitudes of carrier bags. The new leisure activity, Cormac murmurs. New since he was a boy, he means. He and his mother went downtown only when he
needed
a new blazer or school shoes. Nowadays, the shoppers are out even on Sundays thronging the malls and carpet warehouses. Shopping has replaced Sunday worship, he comments, as they wait in the middle of a restless group for the red man to change to green. It is an activity that can be done
en famille
.

‘It’s disgusting,’ says Sophie in a loud voice. ‘Spending all that money when half the world is starving. It’s not as if they need all those things.’

That draws a few dirty looks from those around them. Fortunately the light changes at this point and they all surge forward. Cormac is surprised himself by Sophie’s remark. It wasn’t long ago that she was out with everyone else on a Saturday rummaging for cheap earrings and eyeliner and the latest hit single, spending every penny she could lay hands on, trying
to cadge more when she came home. He notices that she is not wearing eye make-up today and is dressed in some long woollen garment that has seen brighter days. She must have entered a new phase. Surely not in the two weeks they’ve been living apart! Can she have changed that quickly? Or has he been so preoccupied with his own affairs that he hasn’t even noticed? He is cheered, however, to know that Sophie is developing a social conscience. The young are so materialistic now, compared with when he was a student. A pompous thought, but he can’t help thinking it. It’s not their fault: they are products of the market economy.

They pass along by the side of the art gallery and come to the steep rise of the Playfair steps which will take them up to the shoulder of the Mound. As usual there is a grubby young man sitting at the foot of the steps guarded by some sort of German wolf hound slavering unpleasantly between yellow teeth. Cormac has never been fond of dogs since one bit him on the calf when he was a boy. He is an urban man, likes streets and lights and people, and feels that animals have no place in the city fouling its pavements and green spaces. The path along the Water of Leith is littered with dog turds for children to slip and slide on, mess up their hands with, and infect their eyes. Recently a boy, after falling on dog shit on the riverside pathway, has gone
blind. Cormac wonders how this young man manages to feed the dog, though not out loud, for Sophie would certainly counter with a quick attack.